24 HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY OF NEW YORK. 



those extraordinary conditions, to be frozen in the midst of a full vegeta- 

 tive growth, and I suppese the idea was to force the germination. 



I am just wondering whether the reverse could not be done: To 

 put the plant into an extremely hot climate for a time to see if they 

 could not force the plant to adapt itself to a hotter place. 



Mr. Macoun We have growing at the experiment farm now, quite 

 a number of Solanum tuberosum. It is ripening in 62 or 63 degrees in 

 Canada. It seems to me a very interesting fact, because it shows the 

 wide range of the potato. We usually consider the potato, so far as the 

 ripening of the seed is concerned, as having a very wide range, but this, 

 as you know, is a very good many miles north of your latitude, 62, and 

 I think my father was up there in '72 and he noticed the great abundance 

 of potatoes the next spring, after wintering over in the ground, and I 

 feel certain that the seed must have remained over, instead of the tubers, 

 because the seed germinated with a very high percentage of vitality, and 

 I think the point might be very interesting in this discussion. 



Dr. Hansen I was much surprised last fall to see the potato culti- 

 vated a good way north of the Arctic Circle in Europe. The potato has 

 come from Archangel on the Arctic Ocean, down to the experiment 

 station in Northern Norway, and up nearly to the Circle, and they were 

 raising it in that locality. They were rather small, but they matured in 

 that latitude. That shows there has been a change in its early maturity. 

 Mr. Evans In connection with our experiment up in Alaska, I 

 want to say just a word. We have a regular experiment station, of which 

 you will probably hear later on. But speaking of the potato; there is a 

 station up there which is about 60 miles north of the Arctic Circle, and 

 the man there sent me last summer two potatoes that weighed nearly ^ 

 of a Ib. each, well matured, and as a curiosity he saved a number of 

 seed balls with fully developed seeds, and they were sent early in the 

 season, in August, but they were not yet ripe. Up in Alaska, the potato 

 has been grown for the last three years to my knowledge successfully as 

 a garden vegetable. 



The President It has been a surprise to me to see the extreme 

 northerly latitude in which the potato grows. I am quite sure I have 

 seen it a hundred miles north of the Arctic Circle. I don't know about 

 the maturing of the seeds but the tubers matured sufficiently to grow 

 from the eyes without any apparent difficulty. Indeed, they were not 

 able to tell me when the varieties they were growing were introduced 

 into that region, showing for a long period they had continued to grow 

 from the tuber. I was not able to get any information in regard to the 

 seed. I would state also, though it has no specific value, that the potatoes 

 grown there are of very excellent quality. 



We will now hear a paper on "Air Drainage as Affecting the Accli- 

 matization of Plants," by Ernst A. Bessey, Subtropical Laboratory, Miami, 

 Florida. 



